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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25963981">Mutual</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/EmmmaMmmm/pseuds/EmmmaMmmm'>EmmmaMmmm</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>All For The Game - Nora Sakavic</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>5+1 Things, Declarations Of Love, Explicit Language, Implied Sexual Content, Long-Distance Relationship, M/M, Marriage Proposal, Minyard-Josten Rivalry, Soft Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 01:48:09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>4,003</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25963981</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/EmmmaMmmm/pseuds/EmmmaMmmm</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>5 times Andrew was able to heal and 1 time Neil did the healing instead.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>346</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>All for the Game Fics</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Mutual</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>god I cannot tell you how many times I genuinely considered giving up writing and becoming a hermit over the course of writing this. It is the longest thing I've written for this fandom and I hope I remember this feeling when I try to write anything for it again. It caused me physical pain. I'm not kidding (I'm definitely kidding). It is also not edited because frankly, I don't hate myself that much. If I have to suffer, so do you.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span class="u">
    <strong>1. "Please"</strong>
  </span>
</p><p>If you asked Neil, he would probably say that Matt was his best friend. They'd shared a room for almost a year his freshman year at Palmetto, Matt had helped keep him together every time something went wrong, and he was always there to talk when things weren't going well with the new freshmen, especially after Dan left and Neil became captain. Andrew had given him a home, a key, a life, but Matt had been there to enrich it.</p><p>So when Matt, just a year and a half after he'd graduated and about six months after Andrew graduated, asked Neil if he would babysit his first child with Dan, a little girl called Sophie that they'd adopted not long after they got married, he was torn. On the one hand, he wanted to do everything he could to help Matt, to ease his life the way Matt had done for him, but on the other hand, he didn't get much time with Andrew now that he had gone pro, and he didn't want to spend a day away from him for babysitting.</p><p>Matt provided the solution, which really should've been more obvious to him: he and Andrew would both babysit Sophie for the day.<br/>
Andrew drove them both across the state to the Boyd-Wilds house, and Matt greeted them at the door with Sophie on his shoulders. He introduced Neil as his best friend - which absolutely did not make Neil tear up - and Andrew as his best friend's grumpy boyfriend. When Andrew didn't deny the b-word, Neil knew it would be a good day.</p><p>Matt and Dan left, and Neil got to see that Andrew was actually quite good with children. He let Sophie tell him all about her favourite TV show, and even laid down on his stomach so that she could drive her toy cars all over his back and arms. More than anything else, Neil felt at peace and even more proud of Andrew for the progress he'd been making.</p><p>By the time he'd left Palmetto, he'd been getting better at letting people touch him. He'd even hugged his brother and cousin at graduation, something that Neil even to this day regretted not getting a picture of. He had been worried that maybe being away from the people who cared about him might've set Andrew back, but seeing him so calm even as Sophie organised a street race across his spinal cord, he knew that he had nothing to worry about.</p><p>At around midday, Neil got up to make sandwiches and Andrew stayed in the front room, letting Sophie shove her toys at him and playing along when she told him to do something. Neil was just making his way back in when he heard their conversation.</p><p>"Give me the toy." Andrew's voice was low and there was enough intonation that Neil could just about tell it was a question.</p><p>Sophie tapped at her chin. "Say please."</p><p>Neil felt a bone-deep cold seeping in. "Soph-"</p><p>"Please."</p><p>He froze. Sophie beamed and handed Andrew the toy, and Andrew carried on as if nothing had happened. Neil set down the sandwiches, but didn't take any, still wondering if Andrew knew that he'd turned the world on its head.</p><p>Matt and Dan brought dinner back with them and they all ate together. Sophie babbled on about her great day with "Uncle Neil" and "Uncle Andy" - which again, did not make Neil tear up - and then hugged them goodbye when they stood up to leave.</p><p>Once they were safely in the car, Neil wondered how best to bring it up, but it turned out that he didn't need to, because Andrew turned to him before he'd even started up the car with a questioning look in his eye.</p><p>"What."</p><p>"You said... that word." Neil had spent a while trying to decide if he should say it, or if Andrew would know what he meant. "I mean... You told me why you can't. I just..."</p><p>Andrew rolled his eyes and turned the key in the ignition. "It's just a word, Abram."</p><p> </p><p>
  <span class="u">
    <strong>2. "Misunderstanding"</strong>
  </span>
</p><p>Neil wasn't really sure how the Minyard-Josten rivalry came to be. In fact, nobody really was. It felt as though it had come out of nowhere as soon as Neil graduated and was signed to the Houston Thunderbolts. They weren't exactly the best team in the league, but they were known for aggressive plays and they'd assured Neil that he would face no stigma or retribution for either his relationship with Andrew or his past, and so Neil hadn't hesitated to sign, even despite the distance between him and Andrew. It helped, of course, that they were willing to sign him as starting striker.</p><p>The distance, though, made things tough between them, or at least Neil thought it did. It had been one thing, being at Palmetto while Andrew was in Boston, but then he'd moved even further away. The flights, he supposed weren't bad, but it was difficult to fit in time to see each other between practise and matches. Neil had been confident in their relationship for years now, knew that whatever they were was forever, but he hadn't seen Andrew face-to-face in over a month and it was starting to worry him.</p><p>And the Minyard-Josten rivalry bullshit really didn't help. Neil had a news alert on Andrew's name, which meant that at least a few times a week, he received articles about how "Ex-Teammate Jack Whittaker says there is no love lost between Andrew Minyard and Neil Josten" or "Fellow Boston Baron Henry Clairmont says Andrew Minyard doesn't mince his words about Neil Josten". So yes, Neil had been secure in their relationship, but the distance between them and the constant articles were beginning to grate on him.</p><p>The first time Neil saw Andrew after over a month apart was at the match between the Thunderbolts and the Barons. Warming up just on the other side of the pitch to Andrew and not being able to go see him physically hurt in a way Neil hadn't realised it could. When they were each called onto opposite ends of the pitch, Neil ached. Scoring a goal against him was a momentary reprieve, and Neil got to take a look at Andrew, to see how he was doing, though it wasn't very easy to see through the helmet.</p><p>Half time away from him felt like too much. Sitting on opposite sides of the pitch when they were both off at the start of the second half felt like miles. Even afterwards, when Neil wanted to run to him, he couldn't, because he had been assigned press duty (a dangerous decision, he felt, but the sooner it was over, the sooner he could go see Andrew).</p><p>When he finally got to see him, though, in the middle of the corridor outside the locker rooms, he felt irrationally angry for reasons he couldn't comprehend.</p><p>"What the hell was that last shot?"</p><p>Andrew barely reacted. If Neil wasn't used to the microscopic changes in his face, he wouldn't even have noticed the way one eyebrow quirked upwards, the way his eye twitched slightly.</p><p>"You fired it."</p><p>"You didn't even move." Neil crossed his arms. "I thought you were going to fucking try now that you're pro."</p><p>"Whoops." The monotone of his voice sent a fit of rage trembling down Neil's spine and he glared at him across the space between them.</p><p>"What the fuck are you going to do if they decide to drop you then?" Neil clenched his jaw. He wanted to remind himself that getting angry was stupid, that he didn't want to spend the little time he had with Andrew fighting. "What if they decide they're sick of the lack of effort?"</p><p>"Then maybe I will get to move to Houston."</p><p>Neil fell silent. <em>Oh.</em></p><p>"I thought..." The anger left him in one fell swoop, and all that was left was a bone deep emptiness. "I thought..."</p><p>But he never got to say what he thought, because one of the Barons - Henry Clairmont, the asshole - poked his head out of the locker room and saw the two of them. Neil supposed it must look bad - the way Andrew was clearly tensing his entire body, the way Neil seemed out of breath. Henry stepped out fully and shuffled until he was not quite in between them, but close enough to pull them apart if they started fighting. "All good, Minyard?"</p><p>Andrew watched Neil for a moment, the way he fought to compose himself, and then nodded. "Just a misunderstanding."</p><p>Neil, quite suddenly, couldn't breathe. He wanted to scream at Andrew about how he shouldn't push his limits, how he shouldn't use said limits to have the last word, how he fucking missed Andrew so much. But instead, he watched Henry turn him around and lead him into the locker room.</p><p>That night though, Andrew was on his doorstep and didn't let Neil take the opportunity to apologise before he kissed him into silence.</p><p>"I missed you," said Neil later on, tangled up in the covers in just a pair of briefs.</p><p>Andrew watched him for a moment, laid on his front and propped up on his elbows, then he reached over and covered his eyes.</p><p>"Go to sleep." <em>I missed you too.</em></p><p>Neil went to sleep.</p><p> </p><p>
  <span class="u">
    <strong>3. "I want"</strong>
  </span>
</p><p>Spending time in Andrew's flat was possibly Neil's favourite thing to do. It wasn't that his flat was particularly special in anyway except for one - it held the only thing that truly mattered to Neil, or rather, the only person.</p><p>With the season over for Neil, he'd immediately flown over to stay with Andrew and the month that followed in which Neil didn't do much aside from eat, sleep and sink into Andrew's overwhelming presence had been bliss. But of course, everything must come to an end and Neil was on the tail end of packing to return to Houston for pre-season conditioning.</p><p>Neil wanted to call his manager, beg for a few more days, maybe even ask to transfer across to the Barons, but he knew that he had a good thing going in Houston, even if he would have to be without Andrew for a while.</p><p>Andrew, who had given him a key and a home and a life. Andrew, who allowed Neil to spend his time in that odd, euphoric spot between happy and content. Andrew, who had spent the last twenty minutes trying to convince Neil that he needed to take a shower before his flight.</p><p>"I don't have time," Neil had sighed the first time. "I'll shower when I get back," he'd said the second. "I'll miss my flight," he'd snapped the third.</p><p>Then Andrew had moved on from the shower, to claiming that they should stop by the mall before they went to the airport to grab Neil some new running shoes, that Neil's current pair were falling apart and it wasn't good for his feet. After that, Neil hadn't been able to find his phone, and if he hadn't seen Andrew skulking around in the living room for the past five minutes, he almost would've thought that he'd just misplaced it again.</p><p>When Andrew declared that Neil should take a blanket with him in case it got cold in Houston, Neil had practically thrown his suitcase down in frustration.</p><p>"What?" He hated getting annoyed with Andrew when they got so little time together, but it was beginning to get ridiculous. "Do you not want to drive me to the airport? I can get a cab. Or drive myself."</p><p>Andrew's face was blank, and every inch of Neil just wanted some sort of sign. Finally, Andrew turned back to the kitchen and returned with a mug of hot chocolate which must have been interesting because he couldn't take his eyes off of it.</p><p>"I want..." Andrew cleared his throat. His voice was raspy, as though every word was causing him actual, physical pain to get out. "I want... you to stay."</p><p>And Neil <em>hurt</em>. Andrew, who had never admitted to wanting anything in the entire time that he'd known him, was telling him that he wanted him to stay. Andrew, who had never allowed himself to want something wanted Neil to stay. Neil didn't cry usually, but he couldn't help it then, tears pricking at the corners of his eyes. Neil and Andrew didn't hug, usually, but that time they did, and Neil practically had to peel himself off of Andrew twenty minutes later, when there was absolutely no choice but to leave if he wanted to catch his flight.</p><p>In the car park outside the airport, Neil had one final moment of clarity.</p><p>"I'm going to transfer teams," he said and it wasn't an idea, wasn't a hope or dream - it was a promise. "I can't do this again. Next season, I'll sign with the Barons. Or the Eagles. Or the Devils. Next year... No more goodbyes."</p><p>Andrew didn't say anything, but he did lift up one hand to cradle Neil's face, and he did reach up to brush his lips against Neil's forehead, and that was enough of a response that Neil felt emboldened enough to step out of the car and grab his bags from the boot.</p><p>
  <em>No more goodbyes.</em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span class="u">
    <strong>4. "Sorry"</strong>
  </span>
</p><p>Some days, Neil wondered how Andrew coped with everything that Neil was. For example, the way Neil turned up on Andrew's doorstep in the middle of the season, soaked through to his skin, eyes red from unshed tears, with his duffel bag on his shoulder, and Andrew didn't even blink. He just sent Neil to go have a shower, and by the time he got back, Andrew had put his bag in the bedroom. He didn't ask why Neil was there, didn't ask him to leave - not that Neil had really expected him to - he just turned the TV on to some trashy television show and let Neil lean against him for extra body warmth.</p><p>An episode and a half had already played when the silence was finally broken.</p><p>"I needed to run."</p><p>"Okay."</p><p>"But I didn't want to run away."</p><p>Andrew turned to look at him.</p><p>"I don't want to run away anymore," added Neil, playing with his own hands. "When I need to run, I want to run to you."</p><p>"Disgusting."</p><p>Neil smiled just a little at that. Somehow, Andrew's quick dismissal of his own admission made it easier to keep talking.</p><p>"It's been difficult to sort out the contracts," he continued, speaking slowly and quietly so that Andrew could cut him off whenever he felt the need. "I'm still technically contracted with the Thunderbolts, but I'm about two steps away from signing with the Eagles, and that'll only work out if one specific striker does in fact retire this coming season." Neil lifted his gaze to Andrew's, finding his home in the glazed honey of his eyes. "And I've been having nightmares every night, and I don't have..." Neil was coming awfully close to admitting how much he needed Andrew. Something told him that it wouldn't be a problem. "I don't have you to help me calm down afterwards, so I'm running a lot more. Which means a lot more thoughts of running. And it's been... a long season. I just..."</p><p>Andrew sighed, reaching up to ruffle at Neil's hair. "You're an idiot."</p><p>For some reason, Neil found it difficult to believe him when Andrew proceeded to drag him into the bedroom and take him apart slowly and achingly and intimately.</p><p>As they laid there afterwards, Neil felt calm in a way that he hadn't for weeks. After everything, he felt as though he could finally breathe. Andrew was a very efficient way of breaking through the bullshit.</p><p>They fell asleep within minutes of each other. Neil didn't have any nightmares that night.</p><p>Having had regular nightmares for the previous few weeks, however, Neil slept like a log, all but dead to the world. He didn't wake up when Andrew did, didn't wake up when Andrew shuffled on the bed. He did, however, wake up when Andrew did his best to climb over him without budging him, but failed and slammed his knee into Neil's ribs.</p><p>He woke up hunched over, winded and suddenly nauseous. "What the fuck?"</p><p>Andrew knelt down in front of Neil's face, but his eyes were on the spot where his knee had impacted with Neil's torso.</p><p>"I'm sorry."</p><p>Neil was awake, very suddenly. He sat up. "You're what?"</p><p>"Sorry." Andrew stood up and settled himself on the edge of the bed, just to the side of Neil's shins. "Am I not allowed to be?"</p><p>"You've always said..." Neil couldn't put the words together, still waking up from a strange dream - though not a nightmare thankfully - that he couldn't quite remember. "About..."</p><p>Andrew sighed impatiently. "Sorry is never for the other person. Sorry is for seeking forgiveness. I think I deserve the right to seek forgiveness."</p><p>He wasn't expecting a reply. Neil knew that from the way that he stood up and walked out immediately after he finished speaking. Neil wouldn't have known what to say anyway. He wasn't sure there was any sequence of words that would accurately describe what he was feeling just then.</p><p> </p><p>
  <span class="u">
    <strong>5. "Nothing"</strong>
  </span>
</p><p>Transferring from the Houston Thunderbolts to the Salem Eagles had been a long process. There were a few times when Neil had even considered an early retirement just to have some time with Andrew. But the minute he signed the last contract, the minute the statement went out about his transfer, he felt free.</p><p>Andrew had driven up the weekend before to come back with him and his stuff. It was a long journey between Houston and Andrew's flat just outside of Boston, but when Neil finally stepped into the flat that was no longer Andrew's but theirs, it felt like coming home.</p><p>Neil wanted to do everything, to see everything. He wanted to put away his things with Andrew's to see the way their stuff looked side by side. He wanted to make dinner next to Andrew and take comfort in his presence. He wanted to break in the flat as theirs with some extremely unsavoury things. He wanted everything.</p><p>But in the end, they just settled down in front of the TV as they did most nights when Neil first arrived there. At some point they would both have to get up to shower, but for right now, Neil let himself sink into the knowledge that he was home, that he and Andrew were living together once again in a place that was theirs, a place where neither of them would have to leave to start practising for the new season.</p><p>Being on two different teams still wasn't ideal. But being close enough to live together, close enough that they could come home after a long flight and sink into bed with each other - it was a lot more than they'd had for the last few years since Neil's graduation, and it was more than enough for them.</p><p>Andrew switched the channel to some reality show and then left the room. Neil thought he might be going to shower and was tempted to go and join him, but he returned a moment later, his footsteps returning down the corridor and stopping in the doorway.</p><p>"Josten."</p><p>Neil looked up. Andrew was holding something in his hand but from this far away, Neil couldn't tell what.</p><p>"Think fast."</p><p>Andrew threw it. In what had to be the most impressive catch of Neil's life, he caught it, sprawled across the sofa in an effort to avoid letting it drop onto the floor. With his hand curled around the object, he still couldn't see what it was, but he'd seen the way it twinkled in the light as it flew across the room and he could feel the shape of it. He opened his hand.</p><p>"Andrew..."</p><p>A ring. An engagement ring. Not anything particularly gaudy - that wouldn't be their style. Just a simple band. He could see an engraving on the inside and held it up to look at it. <em>Yes or no?</em></p><p>"Well?"</p><p>"Do I have to answer a question you haven't asked?" Andrew raised an eyebrow and Neil looked back down at the ring. "I thought this was nothing."</p><p>Andrew sighed and made his way across the room, resting on the coffee table in front of Neil, his knees on either side of his. "I thought I had made it clear several times that this is no longer nothing."</p><p>Neil looked down at the ring. "You don't have to ask me. It's a yes."</p><p>"Marry me?"</p><p>"Yes."</p><p> </p><p>
  <span class="u">
    <strong>+1. "I love you"</strong>
  </span>
</p><p>They weren't the types for a big ceremony. Neither of them needed to show off their relationship, and they had already known that they were forever. A ring made that obvious to other people - a certificate meant that nobody could keep them apart even if they tried.</p><p>They didn't need witnesses by law, so when they said their vows, it was just them and the officiant. When they said their "I do"s, it was just them and the officiant. When they left the courthouse, officially husband and husband, to start their lives together, it was just them.</p><p>Neil sent a quick message to the Foxes group chat, informing them of the situation, and he and Andrew had both had calls with their team managers to let them know what they were doing, but walking out of the courthouse after they'd signed the certificate and officially married each other, it was just them.</p><p>When they'd talked earlier about how open they would be about the change in dynamic, even when they'd talked to their managers about it, they'd agreed that they wouldn't openly address it, but that they wouldn't deny it either, and they certainly wouldn't hide it. So as they stepped outside, Andrew turned to Neil and offered him his hand - and who was Neil to deny Andrew even a small gesture like that?</p><p>As they walked along the path, Neil's eyes couldn't stop falling to their rings. Marriage had always been a distant concern of his. His parents had been married, and they were anything but a healthy relationship. Since meeting the Foxes, though, he was getting a better grip of healthy relationships. Dan and Matt had been married practically since Matt graduated, had two kids together and were no less in love than they'd always been. Nicky and Erik's wedding had been beautiful, though Neil would never admit that, and he'd even felt a small twinge of pride when he'd watched Aaron and Katelyn reading their vows before jetting off to medical school together.</p><p>Even with all of that, though, he had never once thought that he would be here, married to his safe place with a future stretching ahead of them that looked bright. At eighteen, Neil had thought he'd be dead within a year. Now he had a life with the person who'd given it to him and he was overwhelmed with the possibilities for the future.</p><p>When he stopped walking, Andrew looked up at him with a questioning look in his eyes.</p><p>"I love you." Neil blurted it out before he could help himself, and almost cursed the words as they came. He and Andrew had never said them, had never seen a need to. They knew what they were, knew that they weren't leaving this. Saying them out loud felt like a betrayal of everything they'd stood for thus far.</p><p>But Andrew just lifted their interlocked hands up, pressing his lips against the side of them in such a rare show of affection that Neil thought he might spontaneously combust right there.</p><p>"I know." Andrew spoke against their hands and Neil wondered why he wasn't on fire yet. Especially with the heat that had filled Andrew's eyes when he hadn't been paying attention. "It's mutual."</p><p>
  <em>Oh.</em>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>okay sooo for the record, this wasn't in any way my way of saying that y'all should purposefully trigger yourselves to build up a resistance to it. from personal experience, after a while the things that hurt you that caused the triggers stop hurting, and so the triggers aren't triggers anymore. so to summarise, don't push yourselves further than you're willing to go, I guess.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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